For the past two weeks, Reason, a magazine dedicated to “Free Minds and Free Markets,” has been barred by an order from the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York from speaking publicly about a grand jury subpoena that court sent to Reason.com.

The subpoena demanded the records of six people who left hyperbolic comments at the website about the federal judge who oversaw the controversial conviction of Silk Road founder Ross Ulbricht. Shortly after the subpoena was issued, the government issued a gag order prohibiting Reason not only from discussing the matter but even acknowledging the existence of the subpoena or the gag order itself. As a wide variety of media outlets have noted, such actions on the part of the government are not only fundamentally misguided and misdirected, they have a tangible chilling effect on free expression by commenters and publications alike.

Yesterday, after preparing an extensive legal brief, Reason asked the US Attorney’s Office to join with it in asking that the gag order – now moot and clearly an unconstitutional prior restraint – be lifted. This morning, the US Attorney’s Office asked the Court to vacate the order, which it did. We are free to tell the story for the first time.

On May 31, Nick Gillespie published a post at Reason.com’s Hit & Run blog discussing Silk Road founder Ross Ulbricht’s “haunting sentencing letter” to District Court Judge Katherine Forrest, and the judge’s harsh response. Gillespie noted that Forrest “more than threw the book” at Ulbricht by giving him a life sentence, which was a punishment “beyond even what prosecutors…asked for.”

In the comments section of the post, six readers published reactions that drew the investigative ire of the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of New York. In a federal grand jury subpoena dated June 2, the U.S. District Court commanded Reason.com to turn over “any and all identifying information” we had about the individuals posting those comments.

This is the first time Reason.com has received such a subpoena from any arm of government.

From press accounts of similar actions at other news publications and social media sites, we know that it is increasingly common for the federal government to demand user information from publications and websites while also stifling their speech rights with gag orders and letters requesting “voluntary” confidentiality. Exactly how common is anyone’s guess; we are currently investigating just how widespread the practice may be.

The federal government’s command for information—and request for silence—ironically came just days after the Supreme Court, in Elonis v. United States, strongly limited the scope of what counts as a true “threat” online. In that case, the Court voided the conviction of Anthony Elonis, who had published on Facebook rap lyrics depicting violence against his estranged wife and as a result been sentenced to 44 months in prison for making threats. The Court ruled that context needs to be taken into account when evaluating the true nature of the threatening actions being described. “Federal criminal liability,” the justices wrote, “generally does not turn solely on the results of an act without considering the defendant’s mental state.”